Skip to main content

Depending versus trusting...



Today didn’t start well.  I had a sinking, heavy hearted feeling before I opened the shutters and soaked in the sunshine and the views of the Sierra Nevada mountains which tower behind my little orchard and the chicken run.
Erik  the rooster and the neighbours no brained dog had been awake since 3am. My inner world felt grey.  Nasty, raw, sludgy grey, the opposite of that gentle quiet clear shinning gratitude which often starts my day.

So what’s with this grey stuff ?




Well…what’s good about another major operation looming ( hip), then there’ll be an  eye operation (cataract) - how to arrange help – how to ask for help- where to live for the summer ? Then there’s all the legal red tape stuff with the lawyer and the new residencia card, and the driving licence.  And is my car begining to fall apart? No, no, no !! Please no.

And is the no-brained dog going to bark every night at 3.am? And how often will the young neighbours have a  noisy party  staring at 1am?  This morning, these challenges (especially official things, loud music, and barking  dogs)  felt too much.




So after a quick medicinal  check via FB posts - where I looked for  inspiration and encouragement -  I got it.  Really bulls eye this morning! Thank you FB.



I need to start  depending on God again, rather than just trusting Him/Her/It – for everything.  I started a month ago, then stopped it seems. I need to practice this.  Like Spanish verbs, I won’t get better at it just looking at the book on the shelf.
So how to do this? How to kick start the new habit?




First  it seems, an insight is needed to change the chip. And this morning I got three, all via Facebook!   So the day became incredible, beautiful and poignant,  and included a village funeral  at 6pm. Joaquin who died was 86.  He is part of that generation who will soon no longer exist in Spain. A truly humble gentle country man, he is a part of Andalucian  history.












After the mass I received so much love from my friends and neighbour in Alcazar ( I no longer live there), I came away positively glowing. Surviving cancer is always very good news, isn’t it?




This morning I realised I’ve slipped backwards in depending on God. Even in trusting.  It’s  so easy to disappear into a chaotic emotional blur when there are too many ‘difficult’ things to sort out. But where to start the sorting?

Today, before breakfast, before making any lists at all,  it was a clever little 3 question video on Fb, then a David Whyte poem that did the trick..




The questions -  you have just died- answer the following:

What did you love about your life?
Do you have any regrets now that it’s over?
If you were given one more crack at life what would you do?

First question easy.  Second question a shock and a surprise.  Third question a surprise.




David Whyte philosopher and wonderful poet writes:

REGRET is a short, evocative and achingly beautiful word; an elegy to lost possibilities ….
sincere regret may in fact be a faculty for paying attention to the future, for sensing a new tide where we missed a previous one.
To regret fully is to appreciate how high the stakes are in even the average human life. Fully experienced, regret turns our eyes, attentive and alert to a future possibly lived better than our past.




I leave you with these three simple questions, and hope they give you the kind of insights that made my day today  not just manageable, but magical. 

And as I said in my last blog, Mary Oliver  recommends we - 'pay attention, be astonished (by life), and ( then) tell about it.’

That’s what I wanting to do.

Namaste to you all.




PS. I also found this David Whyte poem this morning - What to Remember When Waking -  here are a few lines from it:

To be human is to become visible
while carrying what is hidden as a gift to others.
To remember the other world in this world
is to live in your true inheritance.




Pics 1 - 5 thanks to Pinterest, the rest mine , with sincere thanks to Merxe for the unforgettable day at her grandmothers farmhouse learning how to make bread, and much more.

Comments

  1. A really beautiful insightful and gently inspirational post to return to again & again with evocative images to adorn the magic of your words. You introduced me to David Whyte...thank you and I'm glad his words resonated on this particular morning. Thank you Meg - once again a timely reminder to 'trust in a higher purpose' and share the burden of the challenges we face xxx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you dearest Bernie for taking the time and trouble to give me honest feedback which is valuable beyond beyond! Some posts kind of write themselves, and this was one. It was such a magical day right after I simply made the decision to depend- rather than wait and trust... such a huge shift for somebody who never learned how to depend on anybody. But the questions were also key, as they did a bit of super important emotional spring cleaning…and gave an insight into what still needs… loving!

      Delete
  2. You have so brightened my own grey morning with your magical weaving of Andaluz images, your paintings and words. Thank you for those questions! x

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you dear Rana,I'm so glad the blog brightend your grey morning. I miss you. I was thinking about you the other day, and your dad, and the liberation of Auszwitz that he documented with his photograhs...what images must have been ingrained in his heart...Much love to you... xxx

      Delete
  3. Thank you for your sharing. I have not seen your blog before. I am thinking of starting a new one myself, this one was just while i was having radiotherapy and maybe a few check ups after. So do share your blogging on FB and I shall continue to read them, reflect and enjoy. With Love, Chris

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you Chris, so nice you took the trouble to respond to the blog.It would be great if you started a new blog, we all need to encourage each other I think in our own ways...and I look forward to reading your new one!! Please send me the link when you get going, or will you continue where you left off on the previous one??

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It's official ! Build Creative Confidence. A holiday course in Spain.

        It's official !    Here's the link to my course at the beautiful Cortijo Romero Center in Andalucia Spain -              February 25th to March  4th 2023.                                                 'Build Creative Confidence '  With the guidance of the marketing manager, we've changed the wording of the Creativity week  I shared with you recently, to fit  more with their  guidelines. It will be a fun and fascinating week because  with all the gifts you will bring with you ...co creation always happens, and we learn lots from each other as a group. There will be a max of 10 people I believe I'm not going to be telling you what to do! I'm planning to open many doors for you by sharing forty years of experimenting, and keeping a drawing dairy for much of that time. https://www.cortijo-romero.co.uk/choose-your-course/courses/?type=&id=2734&name=Building+Creative+Confidence

Stop-Expecting-Too-Much-from-People, Mrs!

At the end of a radio interview when  69 year old , Jewish, Hungarian born Canadian physician  Gabor Mate was asked ‘ is there more love in your life now?’  he paused. ‘I think there is more space in my heart for love,’  he said quietly.  I think  there is more space in our hearts for love when we pass 60. What we do with that space depends on lots of things. And sometimes that space shuts down ! This morning I was deeply disappointed with our village doctor, again. My heart door slammed shut. There seems to be  a Berlin Wall  wall between us. I cannot communicate with him without judging him, severely.   He speaks to me like I'm a teenager with many serious learning challenges. I see in front of me an  arrogant adolescent with mother issues!  LOL !! I thought I'd stopped judging people !! I'm angry that so many folk in our village seem to suffer, month after  month, year after year. Yes I know the  difference between healing and curing.  A kind encourag

Lithuania Calling.

Dear loyal multinational followers, Thank you for keeping on visiting while I've been silent for so many weeks. How does anybody manage a daily blog?? I couldn't. At the moment I've got kittens and chickens and a blind cockerel  to feed, as well as drawings to draw, adventures to live, and so much more. Since starting the blog,  thousands of you  in the US have visited (so love these statistics), and more than five thousand Russians and Ukrainians have looked at my paintings here. Why so many visitors from Russia?  I'm thinking you must be 'resonating' with something in my art , but I doubt many of you are  reading the posts. Of course I could be wrong. I've just discovered my Jewish father's ancestors came from your countries -  Russia, Ukraine, Lithuania and also Poland. What a surprise. Oh bliss and double joy to know this at last!   All my life I'd  had a suspicion about Poland.  Maybe it was just  poetic wishful thinking